Silverdale Baptist Academy broke ground Wednesday on a new academic building, The Commons, as part of an effort to expand the campus and prepare students to be workforce leaders.
“The Commons is more than just brick and mortar,” Silverdale Baptist Church’s senior pastor, Tony Walliser, said during the groundbreaking ceremony. “It symbolizes our commitment to a well-rounded education. … We want you as students to not only have an intellectually excellent education, but we also want you to know how to practically navigate through life.”
The private school’s new building, near the football field, will house a 1,500-square-foot science, technology, engineering, art and math fabrication lab and a consumer science classroom with a kitchen, as well as additional classrooms, meeting spaces and locker rooms.
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Silverdale Baptist leaders and community members joined the school’s student body on the football field to commemorate the groundbreaking Wednesday. Church and school officials led the community in prayer to bless the construction process, and two students led attendees through a worship song.
“All the glory belongs to our God,” Christie Johnson, the school’s director of advancement, said during the ceremony. “This is not about the academy. It’s all for his glory.”
With the new building, Silverdale Baptist hopes to give students more space. The goal is for it to be complete in time for the start of the 2025-26 academic year, the school’s director of instructional support, Cindy Ford, said.
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While the school has areas dedicated to STEAM and consumer science, the spaces are small. The new building will allow students in these programs to spread out more, as well as help as the school looks to build and grow its vocational programs, Ford said.
“We know not every kid is going to go down the college path, and we want to be able to work with them and show them what all is out there in that field,” she said in an interview.
The building is projected to cost $4.1 million and was funded through a mix of donor support and a grant from the Tennessee Department of Education.
Silverdale Baptist Academy, which serves around 1,300 students from preschool through 12th grade, was founded in 1999. Tuition for the 2024-25 school year starts at $10,975 for elementary school students.
Hamilton County public schools have also pushed to expand career and technical education offerings. In 2018, the district launched its future ready institute program, which aims to embed small learning communities at the district’s traditional high schools that focus on a variety of industry themes with the goal of preparing students for careers after graduation. Earlier this year, the Hamilton County school board identified renovation of the Gateway building at U.S. Highway 27 and West M.L. King Boulevard to form a middle and high school with fine arts and career and technical pathways as the top priority in its facilities plan.
Contact Shannon Coan at scoan@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6396.